'The continuous and mysterious praise of the BJP and the chief minister by AIUDF leadership and senior members have affected the public perception of the Congress party'
With the Communist Party of India-Marxist state secretariat deciding not to provide Chief Minister VS Achuthanandan a seat to contest in the coming assembly elections, sources say that the Congress-led United Democratic Front is all set to emerge as a clear winner.
In the coming assembly election, negotiations over seat-sharing will be as important as actual outreach to voters.
In the months immediately following the 2024 tragedy, reporting on the landslide per se had been a straightforward affair. On one side was death and destruction. On the other side, survivors and the business of survival. It was black and white. What direction to take was clear. Rehabilitation in comparison, felt like a complex situation. One that is fraught with shades of grey. As grey as human life, explains Shyam G Menon.
CPI-M general secretary Sitaram Yechury and CPI general secretary D Raja said the top leadership will not attend the meeting called by the TMC chief.
Nationalist Congress Party in Kerala, a component of the Communist Party of India-Marxist-led Left Democratic Front, has conveyed its reservations to the central leadership over the offer of support to the Bharatiya Janata Party to form the government in Maharashtra.
Police said the arrests were made after incorporating two more sections of the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act, 1960 and IPC sections 143 (punishment for unlawful assembly), 147 (rioting) and 149 (every member of unlawful assembly guilty of offence) in the FIR.
Political parties and leaders wait with bated breath for the Haryana and Jammu-Kashmir assembly poll results on Tuesday.
Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan and leadership of the LDF were quick to welcome Jose faction's decision to cooperate with the front.
Modi said his government had made efforts to make all kitchens in the country smoke free.
The Opposition Congress-led United Democratic Fund has alleged that absence of Bharatiya Janata Party candidate against Chief Minister V S Achuthanandan in Malampuzha is part of a clandestine understanding between the Communist Party of India-Marxist and the BJP as they are now together in opposing the United Progressive Alliance at the Centre.
Springing a surprise, Vijayakanth-led Desiya Murpokku Dravida Kazhagam on Wednesday struck an alliance with the four-party People's Welfare Front for the May 16 Assembly elections in Tamil Nadu with the actor-turned-politician being declared as the chief ministerial candidate of the alliance.
Meena said political parties should be responsible enough to decide to what extent they should use the Sabarimala issue during the campaign.
The unrest in the Sandeshkhali region of West Bengal ballooned into a major political row on Thursday as Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee blamed the saffron camp of fomenting trouble in the area, while the Bharatiya Janata Party and the National Commission for Women (NCW) accused her party Trinamool Congress and the state government of being complicit in crimes against women in the area.
Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Sunday alleged that if the Congress-All India United Democratic Front combine come to power in Assam they will open 'all gates' to welcome infiltrators.
Led by CPI-M stalwart, 87-year-old V S Achuthanandan, the LDF succeeded in staving off the anti-incumbency trend against the government, which was reflected in the 2009 Lok Sabha polls and civic elections last year, in which the UDF had stolen march over the Left front.
The ruling Left Democratic Front in Kerala on Monday finalised the seat-sharing exercise among its constituents for all 140 assembly segments for the April 13 polls with lead partner Communist Party of India-Marxist getting the lion's share of 93.
In a huge embarrassment to the Communist Party of India-Marxist in Kerala, party's senior state leader P Jayarajan was on Wednesday arrested in connection with the murder of Indian Union Muslim League youth wing activist Abdul Shukkoor in February.
According to the Election Commission data, 30 out of the state's 40 Lok Sabha seats went to the BJP-led coalition in the latest elections, a sharp drop compared with 39 in 2019 and lower than the tallies of 2014 (31) and 2009 (32).
The BJP-led alliance in Assam is all set to form the government for the second successive term winning 72 of the 102 seats declared so far and is leading in three others.
The RJD said that it is boycotting the swearing-in ceremony of Kumar as the mandate is against the National Democratic Alliance.
The hill shrine had been witnessing protests by devotees and right wing groups against the government's decision to implement the September 28 Supreme Court verdict, permitting women of all age groups to offer prayers at the temple.
The Kerala Assembly on Wednesday unanimously passed a resolution demanding that the Centre provide COVID-19 vaccines free of cost to all states, even as the ruling and opposition members clashed over the COVID-19 fatality numbers in the state.
The rise of Chief Minister V S Achuthanandan after last week's dramatic developments in Communist Party of India-Marxist as the undisputed captain of Left Democratic Front in the April 13 assembly polls in Kerala once again is expected to make the contest tougher for Congress-led United Democratic Front.
Uncertain political times in Meghalaya, Nagaland, Tripura.
After weaning away Biju Janata Dal from the Bharatiya Janata Party-led coalition, the Left parties are now eyeing another National Democratic Alliance ally with senior Communist Party of India-Marxist leader Sitaram Yechury on Sunday holding discussions with Janata Dal-United leader and NDA convenor Sharad Yadav.
Shukla claimed that the current Nitish Kumar-led dispensation would be ousted after the elections and people have started protesting against the ruling alliance leaders in public meetings.
Women's organisations on Monday took out a march towards Parliament demanding removal of Delhi police commissioner and other officers in the wake of rape of a five-year-old girl here, but were prevented by police.
The Communist party of India-Marxist on Thursday demanded a judicial inquiry into the circumstances surrounding the 1995 Purulia arms drop, saying both the Congress and the Bharatiya janata party have a lot to explain in the matter and said Trinamool Congress was a member of the Union Cabinet when Peter Bleach was released on Presidential pardon.
Congress-led United Democratic Front on Friday managed to wrest power from the ruling Communist Party of India-Marxist-controlled Left Democratic Front in Kerala with a wafer-thin majority of two seats in the 140-member Assembly, in the closest poll battle in the state in three decades.
The Congress expressed its 'whole-hearted' support to the 'Bharat bandh' called by farmer unions against the new agri-marketing laws and announced that it will hold protests that day at all district and state headquarters in solidarity with the demands of the farmers. TRS president and Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao said the party rank and file would actively participate in the bandh to ensure it was a success.
Saturday's voting will mark the end to the marathon polling process that began on April 19 month and has already covered 486 Lok Sabha seats in 28 states and Union territories.
The BJP will not announce the chief ministerial candidate before the Assam polls and a decision in this regard will be taken by its Parliamentary Board at the time of forming the next government, the saffron party state unit president Ranjeet Kumar Dass said on Monday.
While EC Secretary General Umesh Sinha would be visiting Tamil Nadu next week, Deputy Election Commissioner Sudip Jain would be in West Bengal in the coming days, sources said.
The Election Commission is making sure that the winds of potential change cause no disruption in the counting process.
Sources said senior leaders of the party have been told to reach out to other leaders of the alliance and talks with some parties have begun.
In a virulent attack on BJP, Congress President Sonia Gandhi on Saturday said the Lok Sabha polls are vital to safeguard cherished national ideals like "unity and secularism" which were under threat.
Coming out against the report of the Supreme Court-appointed Empowered Committee on Mullaperiyar dam, over which Kerala and Tamil Nadu are at loggerheads, Communist Party of India-Marxist veteran V S Achuthanandan on Monday said it was "unilateral and in favour of Tamil Nadu".
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